1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to stacker cranes that travels along shelves storing loads and transfer loads between shelves.
2. Description of the Related Art
In, for example, industrial establishments that handle a large number of loads, loads are stored vertically and horizontally on shelves, and placing and removal of the loads is automated using a stacker crane that moves along the shelves.
With stacker cranes used in clean rooms, it is difficult to reduce the amount of dust generated at the sliding section because the sliding section is large, so sometimes implementations to remove the dust generated at the sliding section are devised.
For example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2008-74542 discloses a technique for capturing dust in a stacker crane having a long mast designed for tall, vertically stacked shelves and a covered area behind the mast where a chain for driving the ascending and descending unit rotates. The dust generated throughout the entire mast is captured by drawing in the air in the covered area with a plurality of fan filter units installed in top and bottom ends of the covered area.
However, with the sort of conventional technique disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2008-74542, the longer the overall length of the mast is, the greater number of fan filter units are required to be attached to the mast, thus increasing the weight of the stacker crane, which necessitates more power to operate the stacker crane.